


Anamnesis

by NanakiBH



Category: Kingdom Hearts
Genre: Bittersweet, Gen, Light Angst, Memories, Rain, Vignette
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-12
Updated: 2018-10-12
Packaged: 2019-08-01 04:25:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,371
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16277756
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NanakiBH/pseuds/NanakiBH
Summary: They found him. They gave him a home when he had nothing. Even if he lost his heart, a part of him would always remember their importance.





	Anamnesis

**Author's Note:**

> I do ship these two, but this fic isn't really shipping them. I'm mostly tagging it this way so more people have a chance of finding it if it's relevant to their interest. I'll swing by with some actual shipping content sometime, hopefully. (KH3, help me out here...)
> 
> I just replayed KH3D and it blindsided me with the fact that Ienzo was still small when he became a Nobody. wtf, man. The thought of a really young Zexion in the Organization makes me sad... So I wrote something!

The air was damp and thick, but it was cold and passed right through him. Standing with his feet firmly planted on the ground, between the hazy glow of neon lights, the young Nobody held his back straight and stared up at the black sky, letting the rain hit his face. He couldn't feel it, though. Its coldness was certainly there, but it was lacking something.

He remembered the rain in a beautiful place.

That place was where he lived, once. But its luster was gone. Like him, it was no longer the same as it'd been. All that remained were the memories and no heart. Even though he found it a little difficult to remember the exact moment when he came to awareness, he remembered the sight of the ruins from over his shoulder. It was gone. The days he'd once lived were gone.

He lacked the heart to know how that was supposed to make him feel, but he kept that memory. It was one of the only things he had. In the rain, he put his hands together, as if he could shelter it there between his palms. He knew, though... If he opened his hands, there wouldn't be anything there. His memories were about as real as he was.

 

Xemnas said that only someone with a strong will could become a Nobody.

Looking at himself, Zexion wasn't so sure.

 

As a real person, what had he been like? His memories weren't enough to answer that question. He remembered laughing, but he couldn't remember what it felt like. To begin with, he hadn't laughed very often. It was only here and there.

In his memory, there was another person, but they sent him away. Maybe that had been a mistake... He was one of the only people who had known how to make him smile.

Smiling...

Was that really something important? He couldn't remember the thought ever crossing his mind, even before. The ability to smile didn't seem necessary for their purposes. Smiling wouldn't help them research the heart or help them obtain hearts of their own, so then why...?

Maybe that curiosity was just a part of what it meant to be a Nobody, unconsciously searching for the thing that would fulfill them. For him, what it meant to have a heart seemed to be locked in those memories. Even though he wasn't capable of sentimentality, he knew that something about those moments must have made them special and worth remembering.

 

“Zexion!”

 

A familiar voice called his name.

His ears still weren't used to that name, but that voice... Something about his insistence, his irritation... It made the corners of Zexion's lips twitch.

 

The sound of footsteps hurriedly descended the wet castle steps.

He was grasped by the arm, pulled back, made to look up at the one who came for him.

 

“What do you think you're doing out here, child?” Vexen asked, his features tight with annoyance and... something else. Even though his brows were pulled together, his eyes were wide. As the seconds passed, he seemed to lose his heat as he was dampened by the rain. The grip he had around Zexion's arm also gradually relaxed until he released him with a huff.

“I thought the rain might make me feel something,” Zexion said, looking at his gloved palms. His hands were empty, just like he thought, and yet...

“Foolish. The only thing you'll get out here is a cold.”

“I read a poem about the rain,” he said, knowing that it wouldn't sound like an excuse. It wasn't supposed to be. But that was why he was there. Because he read a poem.

Words had power. The other members had their own way of defending themselves, but all he had were his books. He wanted to understand everything that was written, even the feelings of the people who wrote the tomes he possessed. He wanted to cherish them. It wasn't enough to simply repeat the words on the page. He couldn't harness their strength without understanding their meaning.

Even a brief passage about the rain...

It frustrated him how little he knew.

It wouldn't have been written if it didn't have a meaning. There was a feeling in the words he couldn't reach. The things in his books were written for someone like his past self. To his current self, the letters were just shapes, and the words were just sounds, endlessly distant from him.

 

“Why did you come for me?”

“Why?” Vexen repeated with a sniff. He paused a moment, folding his arms over his chest. “...It wouldn't do if you ran away now. You might be a brat, but your mind is valuable to the Organization.”

“Hm...”

That didn't seem to be all. Probably, nobody had even ordered Vexen to look for him. The sound of his voice calling out for him echoed into the depths of the hollowness inside Zexion's chest and stirred something from his memory. Just as he stood there, contemplating the memories of his past self, something from Vexen's past must have moved him to look for him. He wasn't simply being compelled, that was for sure.

 

That look on his face and the insistence in his voice...

Those were something, weren't they?

Not like he had any way of knowing without a heart...

 

He wanted to believe that Vexen was worried about him. If that, in itself, was a feeling, then Zexion didn't know what it was even called, but it had to be something. He had a desire. They all did. The fact that they were seeking hearts at all seemed to reveal a hidden truth about the nature of their existence, but Zexion dared not to put those thoughts into words. If he did, their power would have planted a dangerous seed of doubt that would have inevitably grown into distrust. That wasn't allowed.

Xemnas... He wasn't as benevolent as he pretended to be.

 

“Shouldn't we go inside?” Zexion asked.

“Hm? Oh... Yes, of course. I'm only waiting for you to move your feet.”

 

Though, they both continued to stand there. The rain was dreadfully cold. Unrelenting. It almost had a personality of its own. As long as they remained there, receiving its wrath, they could soak in it and hope to absorb what its punishment might teach them.

Zexion placed a hand over his chest. He could feel it filling him up.

Inside, it was raining.

Where a heart should have been, there were rain clouds.

 

“Vexen.” He put his hands down at his sides and looked up at him. “Are you not concerned about getting yourself a heart?”

Vexen didn't waste a second with his answer that time.

“No. I'm not concerning myself with that. Rather, I'm looking at this as a scientific opportunity, and I recommend that you do the same. Preoccupations will only get in the way of progress. If you need something to distract you from our predicament, then focus on work.”

“So you at least admit that what we have is a 'predicament'...”

Vexen's face contorted again with expressions that felt familiar to Zexion. His irritation wasn't so simple anymore. There was something bitter there, too. Regret. Shame.

There was something he was trying to suppress.

“You... You're just a brat. You shouldn't even be here.”

 

Zexion knew that those words weren't a condemnation of his presence. They didn't hurt him.

Vexen was really bad at hiding his feelings.

 

Zexion was glad.

 

There was no changing the fact that they were there. They couldn't undo the decisions they'd made. Even thinking about it was just another preoccupation that wouldn't get them anywhere. There was only one way forward – a narrow path that disregarded their feelings, whether they had them or not. Cold and ruthless, like the rain.

Being a Nobody was a lamentable thing; a pitiable, empty existence.

Even if it would take having a heart to truly grasp the feelings that floated outside his reach, Zexion was glad for that moment. He'd write it into the pages of his memory and ascribe the proper feelings to it in the future, once he had a heart.

For the time, at least he was there. He was with them.


End file.
